Green Bay Packers: Week 9 fantasy football profile
By Kenn Korb
QB – Aaron Rodgers
Week 8 Statistics:
28/38, 246 passing yards, 4 passing TDs, 60 rushing yards, 1 2pt conversion; 33.84 fantasy points
For most of the past couple seasons, Aaron Rodgers has not been producing at the level we came to expect of him. Sure, we still would see magical plays, but they were much further and far between than ever before, and he seemed to struggle at times with completing seemingly routine tosses with accuracy.
After the past eight quarters, any doubts we’ve had are finally starting to get alleviated.
Though the offense didn’t start putting points until the second half of the Bears game in Week 7, the Packers were putting their current offensive gameplan to work. In that half the offense scored just two field goals, but Rodgers went 20/31 passing for 155 yards, while also picking up free yardage on three plays that would have been incompletions but were Chicago penalties which prevented them.
The team also came up just short on TD chances on their final two drives, which would have boosted the stature of the offense’s (and Rodgers’) performance: Ty Montgomery was stuffed at the goal-line on 4th down following a drive where Rodgers went 6/8 for 43 yards (plus a Chicago penalty on a pass attempt), and then Randall Cobb was unable to get his second foot down on Green Bay’s final drive of the half (Rodgers went 4/8 for 44 yards, with a sack, a Chicago penalty for free yardage, and an excellent throw which Cobb just couldn’t finish off).
Following that half — and the unfortunate strip-sack TD to start their first drive — Rodgers stepped up to an even greater extent (19/25 for 171 yards and 3 TDs) to end the night with the most completions in a single game he’s ever had. Then, despite even more injuries sapping away his weaponry prior to the Atlanta game — a matchup where everyone knew his offense would have to score in bunches to win — he kept his rhythm going.
Green Bay scored on four of their first five drives en route to a 24-19 halftime lead, and despite slowing down in the second half Rodgers led the offense on what could have been a game-winning drive with his 4th TD pass of the afternoon (with a successful 2-pt conversion run to boot) to put the Packers up 32-26.
He did get one final chance to try stealing the game at the end, but between the lack of time remaining (:31 left, though with two timeouts) and some unluckiness (Jordy Nelson came up hurt on a second down incompletion, costing the Packers a down as well as a timeout; he wasn’t on the same page with Davante Adams on the final throw) the comeback fell short.
Despite the bad ending to the game, Rodgers has been proving once again that he’s able to perform at a high level, and the Colts are a perfect matchup to keep things going.
The Colts are 29th in total yards allowed per game, 31st in passing yards allowed per game, and 28th in points allowed per game. They’ve garnered just 14 sacks (tied-21st in NFL), have allowed 14 TD passes (tied-22nd), have a measly 2 INTs (32nd), give opposing QBs a passer rating of 103.1 (30th) on 66.8 completion percentage (29th) and 7.9 yards per attempt (23rd).
Delving deeper, Indianapolis comes into this game ranked as the second-worst defense in terms of Football Outsiders’ Defensive DVOA metric; against the pass specifically, they are #29. Going by Pro Football Focus’ player grades, not a single player even reaches an 80 (above-average) on their scale, and at least six of the expected defensive starters grade out far below average.
Add in that their best cornerback (Vontae Davis) is questionable to play, their best pass rusher (Robert Mathis) is far beyond his prime, and every level of their defense is filled with old and/or ineffective players, and Rodgers has a great chance to top his showing from last week regardless of who else makes it on the field with him offensively.